


Try Time And Time Again (Or Until Time Runs Out)

by l3lackbird



Category: I Am Not Okay with This (TV 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Canon-Typical Violence, Not Beta Read, Spoilers, Stanley Barber Has Powers, Stanley Barber-Centric
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-02
Updated: 2020-03-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:40:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22990363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/l3lackbird/pseuds/l3lackbird
Summary: Stan watches the homecoming rewound itself. People move backwards, taking steps behind themselves, Syd’s diary magically reappears, and Brad’s head gets put back together as it had never blown up like a water balloon popping in the first place. He stares in disbelief as the scene rearranges itself, ending with Brad wrangling the microphone from the actual Homecoming king. “Listen up!” Brad yells again into the mic, just like how he did minutes before, and Stan is left speechless. He hasn’t moved from the floor.Or, that alternate universe where Stanley Barber has powers too.
Relationships: Sydney Novak & Stanley Barber
Comments: 18
Kudos: 245





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> F*ggot and D*ke are used in an insulting way, only twice, in the same way they're used in the show. Skip from "He rises..." to "I mean..." if you don't want to see it (which I totally understand).

“Listen up,” Brad yells into the mic, in front of the whole student body after he wrestled the small microphone from homecoming king Jeff Butters, who’s totally a mama's boy from how he started that speech. Stanley’s not by the self-proclaimed football king, but he’s willing to bet that Brad’s breath reeks of cheap dirty alcohol bought from a convenience clerk willing to look the other way with his clothes stinking of teenage boy angsty sweat. 

Stan remembers the proud way his father would talk about being homecoming king, the sure greedy way he held his tone, the reminiscence clicking behind his teeth, and figures that Brad probably wants that same ‘better than thou’ memory his father brags about. He doesn’t know if Brad was even planning to be crowned, that maybe before the whole man-whore shit got out that he figured he’d get picked with Dina. Maybe you shouldn’t be a cheating scumbag then, thought Stanley. 

Brad continues his whole shit performance and Stan had only been paying half-attention to it until Brad’s deep voice calls out someone in the crowd with a certain name. “Sydney Novak!” Immediately, Stan’s eyes snap to where he can make out Syd’s bright auburn hair through the mass of people and he figures, foolishly, that this is a weak and sad attempt to get back at Syd. She’s too badass to be played with. 

She’ll make Brad choke on his words. 

“You see, what a lot of people don’t know about Sydney here… She is one hell of a writer,” Brad continues, reaching his hand into his Letterman jacket pocket and pulling out a cutesy feline mermaid journal and holding it out for the whole student body to see. 

Stan’s heart drops down to his stomach. He doesn’t remember Syd mentioning she wrote in a diary (it’s something he would’ve remember too, because he would’ve wondered if she wrote about him), but either way, there’s no reason for  _ Bradley Lewis  _ to have it. He should do something, right? No, nah, Syd’s got it. She’ll throw his words back in his face. She’ll tell him to suck on his balls and choke on them. 

Then Brad outs Syd to the whole school. “She was kissing my girlfriend.” Brad states, with bone-chilling certainty, with such confidence and conviction that no one could argue against him. Stanley would like it to be false, but he knows it not to be. All of the connections line up to one true fact: Sydney is in love with Dina. 

He realized it when he saw the two of them slow dancing together, their bodies pressed close together and the shy grins on their faces. He noticed the way Syd had looked at Dina from across the room, from when they were sitting on the bleachers after she rejected him in the nicest way possible. (A rejection he always knew was coming, who was he kidding.)

He rises away from the DJ booth and takes some several steps forward until he’s at the edge of the thick crowd. Brad continues, undisturbed by the gasps from around him, as the students part a way through him as if he’s the coming Christ or some shit, “Now, don’t get me wrong, chicks get drunk, they make out sometimes, and I’m all for it, but… being a full on dyke… that’s a whole other ball game.” 

A fire unleashes through Stanley, bubbles up under his skin and snakes along his bones. No one, and he means  _ no one _ , can call Syndey Novak that. She may like women, maybe she’s only into girls, but to use that word in such a manner makes Stan want to punch Bradley in the face. In that moment, all he can picture is his father, lounging on the couch with a beer, watching old reruns of a football game, spitting from his uneven beard, “You look like a faggot.”

“I mean, Syd is fucking in love with Dina. Page after page, it’s absolutely pathetic,” Brad says in a mocking tone, his voice dripping with venom. Lovely, sweet Dina, who Stan will totally offer to smoke with again after this, pipes up with a cold, “Shut up, Brad.”

Yeah, shut the fuck up, Brad. 

“And, my god, don’t even get me started with the daddy issues on this one.” Upon hearing that, Stan finally decides enough to enough and starts to move his way through the crowd, unnoticed. Mentioning her dad is such a dick fucking move. He’s never met her father, but he remembers the rageful look on her face when he mocked him, the intense emotion in her eyes when she threw the bowling balls. “Everyone in her life thinks that she’s a piece of shit. And I mean, everyone.”   
  
“Hey, man! Leave her alone!” Stan shouts as he marches towards the football player, his hands curled into fists. He doesn’t think Syd’s a piece of shit. Yes, she can be spiteful. Yes, she can be rude. Yes, she’s hurt his feelings on more than one occasion. But she can always be incredibly loyal. Extremely funny. Sweet and innocent in her own way. She deserves the world. She deserves happiness. She’s hung the stars in the sky for Stanley without even realizing it. He might be in love with her. 

Bradley Lewis is like his father. He’s douchey and selfish and will be a washed up truck driver after high school. No one will remember him unless they flip through the yearbook that no one buys. This is Stanley standing up to people like his father, men that think they’re at the top of the world just because they’re popular and good looking. People that are just plain cruel and bitter on the inside. 

He doesn’t even make it the whole way before a punch in landing on the side of his head. He hits the floor with a bang that bruises his elbows. A sharp pain floods his head and he knows he won’t be getting up for a while. He’s stuck down there on the sticky punch-soaked ground, a pathetic miserable pansey his father always reminded him that he was. 

Brad continues without missing a beat, as if punching other seventeen year olds is just another boring day in the life of this miserable asshole, “But that is not even the weirdest thing about Sydney… Novak. Get this. Sydney claims that she has-.”

There’s this loud squishing sound, mixed with a horrifying bursting noise, and he feels something wet land on his shoes. Then there’s this array of pure screams and his first thought is:  _ I hope Sydney’s okay.  _ He shifts up on his bruised elbows and stares in horror. 

Dina’s crouching down, her whole front body covered in blood, next to the remains of Bradley Lewis. His head is just… gone. Surrounding his neck is a large pool of sticky red, with some footprints trailing out of it as people rush for the exits. Someone steps on his hand, but he hardly feels it. Brad’s gone. Sydney, and he knows it’s Sydney because there’s no one else with head-bursting powers, had popped that kid’s (and he’s a kid, just like the rest of them) head like he had been a regular pimple on her thigh. 

He notices her diary, the same one Bradley had been holding only moment before, but it disappears under the running from the student body. It’s too strange to be kicked, he would’ve seen someone’s foot made contact with it, but instead it’s simply.. gone. Like Brad’s head. There one second, bursting like a burrito in the microwave the second. 

His mouth is dry as he scrambles up, trying to keep his footing as people elbow him and shove him to the side. This doesn’t feel real. Is this real? He should be screaming now too, but all he can feel is this chilled numbness that spreads throughout his body. His heart is beating rapidly, he knows that, but it doesn’t register. He swallows the thick desert in his mouth as he moves towards Dina. She’s covering her mouth with her hands in disbelief. 

Stan rests his hand on her shoulder and she flinches so hard she almost falls into the blood. “Woah, it’s just me,” he rushes to say, trying to keep his voice light-hearted. It’s weak and shaky, a horrible attempt even for him. “We gotta go and gotta find Syd. The police will be here and we have to protect her. Make sure she doesn’t blow up anyone else, right?”    
  
He realizes he just outed her as the person responsible for the chaotic murder and wants to clock himself in the head. He’s off his game, though from looking at her he’s pretty sure Dina doesn’t even hear him, she’s caught up in her head and grieve, her disbelief. Stan follows her line of sight, a view he’s been deliberately avoiding, and swallows his spit. There’s.. chunks, small mushy chunks right next to Brad’s neck, and the pool of blood has spread to where Dina’s high heels are standing in it. 

Stanley wishes he could turn back time. He’s in shock, obviously, but he still craves to be able to shift the events of the night back to before Brad got up to the stage, back to before… before all of this happened. 

He recalls his first answer to when he was first asked what kind of superpower he would want. He had thought at the time, being as high as a kite flowing in the wind, ‘Oh yes, I want to be a shapeshifter so I could rule the world with the jellyfish as a giant-ass jellyfish’, but now all he wants is to turn back time so this night never even happened. He wants to go back laying down on the ground with Syd and comparing the pimples on their body.    
  
“I want to go back in time,” Stan murmurs out loud absently, his mind in a different place, and he feels his fingertips tingling as if he’s stuck them in a socket. He glances down at his hands, with his bitten nails and skinny wrists, but they don’t look any different. 

Then he looks back up and thinks, _ I gotta stop smoking before school dances,  _ because everyone is suddenly moving backwards. He rises up on his feet with a strangle in his throat as he looks around in disbelief. His classmates are blurry and see-through, ghosts in another dimension, as they run backwards. He barely manages to step to the side to avoid one, a girl named Miley Hansburger, but when he reaches out to ask her what’s going on- his hand goes through her elbow. 

Nausea swims in his stomach. “Dina, what’s going on? You can see this too, right?” He babbles, his eyes casting down at her, but she’s moving weirdly too. She stands up and takes one step backwards, her head shifting towards him, but not looking at him. He realizes Syd’s come back, still covered in blood, her eyes wide. 

All the blood covering her seems to leap off. The large pool of red gets sucked back into Brad’s neck hole, then the body rises on its own and crazily, he swears this happened, Brad’s head gets put back together. He’s not joking and it’s not a conspiracy theory, he’s not high and he’s not drinking. All the blood and guts and squishy bits fuse together and Brad’s straight strong nose is back and so is his chestnut brown eyes and his hard-lined mouth. 

“Holy shit,” Stan whispers under his breath. Brad, now completely put back together, holds the microphone back up to his lips. All the blood is gone. The evidence has been cleared out. There’s nothing to show that the event even took place. Everyone’s back standing in a crowded circle, giving Brad the space and attention he so desires. 

Like a switch, Brad starts talking again. As if he hadn’t been dead just moments before. “But that is not even the weirdest thing about Sydney… Novak. Get this. Sydney claims that she-”

“APPLESAUCE!” Stanley screams immediately, the word blurting from his lips as if it jumped off, scorching his tongue with the intensity it burned. He doesn’t know what came over him, he may be weird but he has no habit of saying words that don’t make sense. All he knows is that he never wanted to see (or hear, really, since he didn’t see it before) Bradley Lewis’ head explode again. 

As if on cue, everyone goes silent. Brad lowers the microphone an inch, his lips parted in disbelief, and he can feel Syd jump beside him as she just now realized he was there. Did he. Did he seriously go back in time? Or see the future? Well, no time to think about that now, he’s got to make something up on the spot. Bullshitting, his own personal superpower. 

“How do you know that even belongs to Sydney? She’s all beige colors and drab looking, and that diary is seriously not. As her token best friend, I have to say she wouldn’t touch something that girly with a ten foot pole. Seriously. One time we were at the arcade and she won a prize; a teddy bear. Do you want to know what she did with it?” He takes a breath, he can feel everyone’s stares at him. He pauses for dramatic effect.    
  
Bradley scowls and takes a step forward, probably to punch him again, but Dina, sweet, badass Dina, takes a step in front of Stan. Like a protective shield. 

He continues with a loose smile, pretending everything is fine and his heart isn’t running a million miles per hour, stating boldly and proudly, “She set it on fire.” This earns a couple chuckles from the student body, which is good, he needs to get them on his side. “How do we know you’re even telling the truth? You’re a cheater! A big stinky cheater who’s drunk right now. You’re delusional, Brad. Go to bed.”   
  
He reaches past Dina with his long spindly arm and plucks the diary from Brad’s thick fingers. He can hear his heart pounding behind his ribs as he holds the diary close to his chest. A teacher finally comes in between them, pushing Brad back and hopefully escorting him out. Stanley’s breathing fast, his breath comes in short bursts as if he ran a marathon, though he continues to smile as if nothing’s wrong. 

He glances at Syd and sees her pale-stricken face, the way she’s clutching her dog tags like a lifeline. He gently wraps an arm around her shoulder, telling Dina, “I’m going to take her home. I uh, don’t have enough room in my car though, sorry. I’ll talk to you later? Thanks for being the most badass lady ever.”   
  
Dina narrows her eyes and parts her cherry glossed lips, but when she notices the shaky way Stan’s holding himself, the dead look in Syd’s eyes, she nods slowly. He breathes out a sigh of relief and begins to steer Syd to the exit, ignoring any attempts of people trying to talk to them. Once they’re outside, he lets go and opens up the small metal casing he carries around in his pocket. Syd wordlessly takes one out and he lights it up, then they begin to walk towards his car. She seems lost in thought and he wonders if any of those thoughts are about him. 

“Syd.” At the mention of her name, she turns towards him, her icy blue eyes digging into him. He clears his throat as he opens the passenger door for her. He hands over the diary without complaint. He’s not even thinking about how he’s leaving his date behind. “I.. think I have powers. Or something.”   


“Nope.” Syd remarks, slipping in and putting on her seat belt. He dances around the front of the car to get to the driver’s seat, settling in on the worn seat, and squeezing his hands around the steering wheel. She continues, “I know you’re trying to cheer me up, but can you shut the fuck up. I.. can’t believe Brad did that. No, I  _ can.  _ Ugh, he’s such a douche! I wish I could’ve just, exploded his head to make him shut up.”

Stan tastes blood in his mouth and swallows it. He probably shouldn’t be driving thanks to the punch Bradley gave him, though that feels like two lifetimes ago. He thinks of everyone screaming, the blood covered ground, and the quiet reserved way Dina held herself above the body. 

“Yeah. Maybe next time you do that.”


	2. Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two; Stan's life got a whole lot more screwed up. Also, why him? Seriously, why him.

After dropping Syd off, Stanley Barber realizes he doesn’t want to go back home. 

Maybe his deadbeat father finally left to go drive dirty trucks along the highway, maybe his father is snoring on that ugly couch with his musty feet kicked up along the sticky coffee table and beer cans rolling along the ground, but if Stan had to bet his stash or his fingers or Syd’s secret on either of those, he wouldn’t take it. He feels this boiling buzz inside his veins, as if a million tiny bees have crawled under his skin and stung him. 

Stan knows exactly what would happen if he goes back home to face his thin cut father with bony, sharp knuckles. He’ll stand in the doorway with his shoulders caving in and his father would offhandedly glance at him with those piercing judgmental eyes and some toxic words would flow out from his father’s cigarette stained tongue. Stan would stand there and take it, unable to stop the words from digging into his ears and brain, only for them to be repeated over and over as he tries to sleep. 

So, he doesn’t shift in reverse or turn his steering wheel to do a U-turn to coast down the road back to his place. Instead he puts the gear out of park and gives Stan-Mobile some bits of gas as he continues driving up the long expanse of road. He knows there’s another town out there, more modern than his hillbilly town, his town that looks like it’s stuck in time. Hah. Time. Like the backwards shit that happened earlier. 

“Happy thoughts,” he murmurs out loud, pressing his foot down harder as the speedometer starts to rack up the digits. If he closes his eyes, he’ll see the scene painted on the back of his eyelids, Brad’s cocky grin and Syd’s panicked expression then this explosion.. Luckily for how hard he’ll try to go fast, his mustard car won’t go anything past 50. 

He doesn’t have enough energy to go to the other town. It’s a forty minute drive, an hour plus for there and back, and he doesn’t want to be gone that long. He needs to stick around, you know, just in case Syd needs him. She’s needed him in the past. She needed him tonight. He slows down his beaten up car (he would never blame Syd but it was technically her fault) and drives off the road to park alongside the darkness of the forest. 

He notices how the forest looks unappealing this time of night as he slows down to stop. Scary in the broadest terms of words. The trees soar high in the sky, disappearing in the night so he couldn’t see the peaks, with thick overhanging branches and brittle leaves. His eyes, chestnut and narrowing, stare into the deep shroud of wilderness that would encompass him if he set foot within them. He thinks, with his car fully in park: Does he dare?

When he was little and clingy, unable to sleep, his mother would tell him a story, partially to keep him out of the woods and partially to make him shut up. It went something along the lines of she was a young girl and went in there by herself. She was playing on the edge of her property when she heard this high siren of a voice call her name from within the trees.

Like any dumb child (when she said this, she would pinch his nose), she followed the voice. It led her deeper and deeper into the woods as the sky got covered with dense, heavy clouds. It was night when she found the voice; a handsome fae. The fae tried to trick her into giving her name away and grew forceful when she adamantly refused. She would always make the battle sound awesome, of her flinging rocks at the faery, of the fae’s nasty sharp teeth, but he always fell asleep before the ending. He never knew if she got away or not. 

She supposedly still has a scar from this experience, a thin one down along her arm, but he remains doubtful. It wasn’t until years later when he overheard her and his father arguing fiercely in the kitchen did he realize the fae was actually a regular man. 

Stan opens his car door and it squeaks loudly, a harsh plea to rethink his trailing thought process. He steps through, his old shoes crunching on the gravel, and starts walking towards the gloomy, brooding trees. He was a talking tree in an elementary play once, before Syd and before powers, and his father actually managed to show up to the performance not drunk. During the nights he was practicing his one line, his father would grovel and murmur horrible names under his heavy breath, but that night under the bright lights and thundering applause, his father was silent. 

The wilderness isn’t silent. There’s the low croaking of frogs and the shrill rubbing of cricket legs. His heart picks up, as if it’s ringing him from a telephone and telling him that this is a seriously bad idea, but like how he deals with most things, he ignores it. There’s mist and though it’s in thin patches, it adds a lot to the ambience and scenery. It makes the world look like it’s come from a horror game. As if this night hasn’t been horrific enough with Brad’s head-. No, he shouldn’t think about that (even as the images replay in his mind).

He breathes in the crisp air and lets it cool his lungs before breathing it out. He can almost see it if he squints. The walk into the wood is slow going and he takes his time looking up at the thick branches that could kill him easily if one decided to snap off. He hopes the trees are in good graces tonight and accept his presence. 

“Oh, wise ones, please spare me,” he half-jokingly asks, his tone lighthearted and his mood shifting. It’s comforting, kinda, to be surrounded by nature. He knows why his aunt goes on the long hikes now, as nature listens and offers advice, and never judges. But then a tingling sensation goes down his spine. 

You know how people can tell they’re being watched? He feels the weight of eyes on his back, the dryness in his mouth, the churning anxiety in his gut, and when he turns around, there’s no one there. The light is dim enough they could be lurking behind some trees, almost in plain view, and he wouldn’t be able to tell. 

Stan takes a stab in the dark. “I’m chill if you’re chill, but if you’re a creepy murderer then you should know I know karate.” He doesn’t, even as he raises his arms. He took one class in middle school before he dropped out. Anyone who knows him knows he’s a weakling. Even Syd. 

A tense moment goes by with nothing happening. A crowd of birds squawk as they beat off the branches. A nipping breeze flows under his armpits and between his legs. Everything seems serene.. 

He’s not surprised when something powerful and heavy hits him in the back, but he’s aghast when the force is enough to take him to the dirt packed ground. The wind gets shoved out of his lungs when his front is slammed into the leaves, leaving him choking on nothing. He barely has enough mobility to squirm so he’s facing his attacker instead of breathing in moss. 

Brad-. Wait, that’s not Brad. He’s so unbelievably whiplashed into it not being the douchebag that he allows the mysterious man to grip the sides of his neck. There’s so much mist he can’t see clearly, this dark shroud of smoke surrounding them, so black he’s afraid to breathe it in. Though he’s having struggles breathing normally, there’s pressure at his throat, large calloused hands pushing inwards. He fights to be able to breathe. Like a foolish coward, he squeezes his eyes shut. 

Stan’s not going to die today. He’s not going to die today. Please, dear whoever is in control here please do not let him die today. That would be so unfair, in comic books the good guys never die (ok that’s a lie but bare with his scrambled jumbled half-baked thought process). He claws half-heartedly at the hands that immobilized him. 

Then time starts to move backwards again. The attacker is lifted off of him with ease, as if a giant plucked them off, flying through the air from where they jumped out. He opens his eyes just in time to catch them disappearing, as if they were never there. It’s.. It’s strangely in tune with Syd’s strange stalker. The same grey wisp he caught a frame of in the school library video. Oh jesus, Syd’s stalker wants him dead- could want her dead.

Though he’s unbelievably tired and soaked in sweat and covered in dirty leaves, the thought of Syd getting choked out in a non-sexy way is enough to have him scrambling up. His legs protest as he sways, his arms drag towards the floor, but he starts to run back to his car. This night has been chaotic enough and while he would love to smoke before bed, he has to make sure she’s safe. Yes, she can take care of herself, but also the last time didn’t really go so well. 

Stan collapses in his front seat and turns on the ignition. The engine sputters and croaks and fails to start. He slaps the dashboard with his open palm, cursing under his breath, and tries again. His car has never truly failed him before, not really, though of course now when he needs it the most does it decide to die. If he had another hour or thirty minutes then he could pop open the lid and hit it a couple of times. The time to do that doesn’t exist. 

He jumps out of his car and kicks at the tire with his grimy shoe, biting his cheek when it ultimately hurts him more than the vehicle. “I needed you,” he hisses at the Stan-Mobile, then blinks as headlights pierce into his eyes. He doesn’t have enough time now (he’s not sure how long he rewound, and wow he’s adjusting fast to having powers (it’s a breakdown for another time)). 

“Hey! Slow down!” He waves his arms in the air as he shouts at the truck, this sleek grey truck that probably costs more than his car ten times over. Against all odds and Stan’s bad luck, the truck slows down to a gradual roll, pure inches from hitting Stanley. It’s almost like the driver wanted to hit him. 

He bounces up to the driver’s door and patiently waits for the window to roll down. The driver isn’t someone he expected to see. 

Bradley Lewis stares down at him, his small chap stick-covered lips pressed into a thin line, his fair brown eyebrows furrowed as if Stan had done something to personally offend him, and his normally cleanly gelled hair wild and crazy, not tamable for once. He’s Brad, but he looks almost nothing like him. His cheeks are rosy from beer, his breath smells like Stan’s father’s body odor, and his bitter chocolate eyes are hazy and barely focusing on him with deep bags. Drunk. With a capital D.

“Oh fuck me,” Stan mutters before opening the truck’s door. “Why are you even here? Not that I mind for once, but driving while intoxicated? I’m not even dumb enough to do that and you shouldn’t either, not after your head-”

The words die in his throat as he ushers Brad into the passenger seat. He climbs in, clicking his seat belt in (and after looking, clipping Brad’s in as well), then shakily trying to make a U-Turn on the small cramped road. “Bro, I was coming here to kick your ass,” Bradley slurs, obviously having more to drink after the whole dumb stunt at homecoming. 

“I would kick my ass too,” Stan murmurs absently, checking in the rearview mirrors in case they’re being followed. “Plus, I don’t think you’re in the ass-kicking capabilities right now. You have to at least be able to walk three feet without stumbling to kick someone’s ass. What if the person you’re pounding on runs away? How are you going to get them if you keep falling over and puking?”

“Jesus, do you ever shut up?” Brad complains, and through the side of Stan’s eye, he sees him lean his head against the window, watching the tree fly by them at remarkable speed. Holy shit does this truck go way faster than his car, who he had to regrettably leave behind. He’ll get it later when he’s not in mind-blowing danger. 

“Seriously, where are you even going?” Brad continues, undeterred by Stan’s initial lack of response. “Why were you out there to begin with? Dude, answer me. Now.”  
Stan smacks Brad’s hands away from the steering wheel. Getting into a car accident in someone else’s car would be the cherry on top of this smoking burrito. He grits his teeth, and thinks over his answer for once. Maybe he shouldn’t go to Syd’s. Maybe he should just call her- like any other normal teenager would do. 

“I’m dumb,” he mutters, slowing the truck down as he fumbles with his back pocket, managing to pull his old Samsung out. He drops it in Brad’s lap with a cold, “Call Syd. She’s on speed dial.” He doesn’t have any locks because he considers them a waste of time in a world where the government tracks your every move electronically. 

“Call that freak? No way. I don’t have’t do anything you tell me to.” Brad manages to say, his voice slurring, his tone shifting from annoying to disinterested. Stan growls in anger, like a dog his mom would say, and takes back the phone. Briefly ignoring every lesson his dad has given him on road safety and looking at the screen to call her. 

He puts it on speaker, just for convenience, and drops it on his lap as he swerves to avoid a street lamp. Really, it was no big deal. He’s the best driver he knows. It rings, and rings, and rings, before Syd finally picks up. 

“What?” She grovels into the phone, sounding tired and flat out irritated. It’s different from her frustrated voice. 

“So- I- Uh-. Just, are you safe? I would lock the doors and windows,” he answers. 

“Why? Stan, did something happen?”

“Kinda. I’ll… explain to you later. Stay inside and you know, I totally believe you on the stalker thing. Keep a baseball bat beside your bed. In case of emergency.”

Syd starts to say some more, but he can’t hear it. All he can think about is Bradley Lewis sitting beside him. Alive. The things that run in his mind aren't explaining to Syd that he was attacked, but showing the moments like a highlight reel in his brain. He kept his eyes shut, like an idiot, so he doesn’t know who hurt him. Only that it technically never happened. 

He really needs to get a grip on these powers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't like the ending of this chapter, but I don't really want to look at it any longer. What do you think? How do you feel about Brad showing up? Tell me all your thoughts. I hoped you liked it!

**Author's Note:**

> Stan/Syd is never going to explicitly smoke/get high because of my triggers, sorry lol.  
> I hope y'all liked this! I absolutely love this show and can't wait for season two.


End file.
